More Muni riders left waiting as trains stop short of destination

Muni passengers wait for the next train after their N-Judah was turned around at Judah Street and 19th Avenue.

Muni passengers wait for the next train after their N-Judah was...

To some Muni Metro riders, there’s nothing worse than hitting the end of the line before the end of the line — that’s called a “switchback,” when the train is turned around to patch service holes behind it — leaving those riders waiting on the sidewalk for another train.

And since 2013, switchbacks have more than doubled on every Metro line of the San Francisco railway.

Last year, Muni ordered 5,345 switchbacks, up 57 percent since 2013 when 3,403 occurred, according to a Chronicle analysis of Muni data. The unexpected drop-offs increased on every line, with the biggest jumps on the J-Church (104 percent), M-Oceanview (100 percent), N-Judah — the line with the most overall switchbacks (48 percent) — and KT-Ingleside/Third Street (43 percent). The S-Castro shuttle, which had the fewest switchbacks overall, increased from one in 2013 to four in 2016.

Paul Rose, a spokesman for the Municipal Transportation Agency, said the increase is because of an uptick in the number of large public demonstrations and problems caused by aging infrastructure, like track switches, rails and signals. Also, during the past six months, 20 days had more than 40 switchbacks because of increased ridership, he said.

Muni uses switchbacks when the vehicles become bottlenecked in the system, creating a logjam where trains follow one another too closely. Switchbacks occur most frequently on outbound trains. Muni officials say it improves transit times.

Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle

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Mickey Lim’s L-Taraval ride from his Castro job to his Outer Sunset home is un pre dictable be cause he of ten has to switch trains.

Mickey Lim’s L-Taraval ride from his Castro job to his Outer Sunset home is un pre dictable be cause he of ten has to switch trains.

Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle

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Passengers disembark from the N-Judah train during rush hour.

Passengers disembark from the N-Judah train during rush hour.

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, The Chronicle

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Passengers are seen through a window riding the N-Judah train.

Passengers are seen through a window riding the N-Judah train.

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, The Chronicle

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Passengers disembark an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue that discontinued its service.

Passengers disembark an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue that discontinued its service.

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, The Chronicle

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People gather along the sidewalk after disembarking from an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue that discontinued its service.

People gather along the sidewalk after disembarking from an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue that discontinued its service.

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, The Chronicle

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People wait for the next train after an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue discontinued its service.

People wait for the next train after an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue discontinued its service.

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, The Chronicle

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People gather along the sidewalk after disembarking from an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue that discontinued its service.

People gather along the sidewalk after disembarking from an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue that discontinued its service.

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, The Chronicle

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People gather along the sidewalk after disembarking from an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue.

People gather along the sidewalk after disembarking from an N-Judah train on Judah Street and 19th Avenue.

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, The Chronicle

More Muni riders left waiting as trains stop short of destination

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But the switchbacks vex voters who passed a $500 million bond in 2014 to improve the transit system. It was sponsored by Supervisor Katy Tang, whose district includes the Sunset. More than two years later, Muni has spent only about $14 million of the money, according to an agency official, and switchbacks on several lines have doubled. Tang’s office has been fielding complaints from residents whose property taxes went up to finance the bond.

MTA Director Ed Reiskin said the delays in spending the bond money come from overly optimistic project deadlines that have since been pushed back.

“There’s no question we have challenges, especially with the suite of projects we had teed up with these dollars,” he said. “I’m not happy with the pace of spending on this bond or any of our other revenues. Everything we are doing is trying to shorten that time.”

In 2013, 24 percent of switchbacks happened during peak travel times, from 7 to 9 a.m. and 5 to 7 p.m. In 2016, that jumped to 31 percent.

“When we do order a switchback, our policy is to only do one if there is a train five minutes behind, and we do ask that operators make announcements,” Rose said. “It is something we have been trying to get better at over the years. We are going to continue doing work on improving switchbacks.”

Commuters, who often cannot hear announcements crackling over the train’s speaker systems, say the switchbacks shouldn’t happen at all. Only 22 percent of them were satisfied with Muni’s overall communication, a 2017 agency survey showed. About 25 percent said they were satisfied with the agency’s overall service reliability.

Sometimes Sarah Stromska thinks it would be easier to just sleep at the office. The 35-year-old shuttles from her home near Ocean Beach to her job at a startup software company near AT&T Park. But riding the N-Judah streetcar has become a long, slogging ordeal. Muni routinely orders switchbacks, dumping Stromska and a fleet of other commuters off with no warning, stranding them until the next train arrives.

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, The Chronicle

Muni’s N-Judah train rolls along on Judah Street. The line has the most “switchbacks,” in which trains are taken out of service to prevent bottlenecks.

Muni’s N-Judah train rolls along on Judah Street. The line has...

“On a good day, it takes an hour to get home by taking Muni,” Stromska said, sighing. “But then a switchback happens, unbeknownst to me until we get a block away. It’s death by a thousand paper cuts; it’s an annoyance that accumulates over time. It already takes so long to go such a short distance.”

City Hall officials are flummoxed as to what to do. The $500 million bond that passed in 2014 — the Transportation and Road Improvement General Obligation Bond, the first bond for Muni since 1947 — was hailed as a measure that would improve Muni. In a 2014 presentation, Muni promised to make service “less crowded and more reliable and improve safety for everyone getting around. ... The benefits of the bond will be felt in every San Francisco neighborhood.”

At a Board of Supervisors Government Audit and Oversight Committee meeting this month, Board President London Breed maligned the MTA for failing to spend the money in a timely fashion.

“I am concerned that the MTA is misusing our trust,” she said. “With every passing day, we are paying interest on the bonds that we have sold but are not using. With each passing day, the value of this money goes down while the cost of construction goes up, meaning the MTA can’t deliver the same quality or quantity of improvements that the bond money could originally have had.”

While many of those projects would not impact switchbacks directly, it would improve overall reliability within the system and how quickly commuters are able to get around. That could prevent overcrowding on Muni’s most popular lines.

Of the bond money, $191 million is supposed to go to Muni Forward, which will improve service on Muni’s highest ridership lines — the ones most commonly affected by switchbacks. The L-Taraval Transit Improvement project, a $2 million package that would fix tracks, trolley wires and poles along the line, is still under construction.

The N-Judah Transit Priority project, stretching from Arguello to Ninth Avenue, would build transit priority lanes along the busiest corridor. The $3.2 million project is still in the design phase, and completion has been pushed back to next year.

In 2013, Tang worked with the MTA to create a switchback action plan with new rules about who could authorize switchbacks, when they could occur and how they must be logged. But she remains frustrated by how little progress has been made.

“I think that the bond funding and the capital improvements have everything to do with reliability,” Tang said. “MTA’s response on the switchbacks in general is that this is part of our system, that we need to do this,” she said. “I’m saying it is unacceptable because our residents feel abandoned by Muni. They deserve to be able to get on a train from start to finish and end up where they’re going.”

Muni rider Mickey Lim, 53, who commutes to the Castro from his home at 45th Avenue and Quintara Street, shares that feeling.

“My feeling is that they need to have some human decency and give us the opportunity to get off the train at the last station, rather than leaving us on a street corner,” Lim said. “We are stuck in the dark, in the cold, in the fog, in the rain, without any warning. I understand that this has to happen sometimes, but they need to hold up their end to ensure it happens as little as possible.”

Stromska said switchbacks added “insult to injury” — making trips longer than they need to be.

“At the end of the day, it’s like, I’ve been on this train for ages, and now you tell me I have to get off,” she said.

Later, 45 minutes into her commute, Stromska’s train switched back at 19th Avenue. She stepped off the vehicle to wait in the dark.